Doha Film Institute
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Faced with an unintended pregnancy, a young Lebanese woman’s shame, fear and denial turn into a ghostly veil that haunts her, forcing her to redefine her relationship with men, her city and her oblivious mother.
Layal, 21, returns home one night after a sexual encounter and joins her mother Salma, who is unaware that her daughter is sexually active. The weeks pass as Layal roams the empty spaces around her house at night before taking a pregnancy test—it’s positive. Avoiding her mother, she spends time with her best friend Dania and the pair go on a fruitless search for the father. Learning of a clandestine abortion clinic in the suburbs of Beirut, they venture there at night. After witnessing the mishandling of the procedure on a patient before her, Layal flees the clinic in fear of her life. She attempts to signal for help from her mother, whose attention is focused on her friend’s daughter, who took her own life when faced with a similar situation to Layal’s.
The man who impregnated Layal returns. Much older than Layal and well off, he pays for her to go to a better-equipped clinic. Layal spends the last days of her pregnancy contemplating motherhood, despite knowing that there is no place for single mothers in Lebanon. Assuming a pseudonym, she goes through with the procedure. After the abortion, Layal walks into her house, and she sits facing her mother, sharing a long silence between them. Layal shifts her gaze towards pictures of her and her mother hung on the wall, before breaking the silence with a mundane conversation.

Credits

Director
Remi Itani
Screenwriter
Remi Itani
Producer
Michael Graf, Sara Bonakdar

About the Director

Remi Itani
Remi Itani is a Lebanese film director and producer. Remi started her career as a documentary director for Al Jazeera Documentary Channel. She is a graduate of the London Film School, obtaining an MA Filmmaking with distinction and has participated in numerous writing and directing workshops, including the Torino Next lab and a filmmaking workshop with Werner Herzog in Cuba. Her most recent short
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